


Ground Beneath Your Skin

by NamelessDragon



Series: Of Two Minds [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Brainwashing, Canon Divergence - Avengers (2012), Dehumanization, Electrocution, Gen, Hurt Bucky Barnes, Hurt Loki (Marvel), Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Medical Experimentation, Medical Torture, Memory Loss, One Shot, Psychological Manipulation, Torture, open ending that leans towards happyish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2020-02-27 18:09:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18744331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NamelessDragon/pseuds/NamelessDragon
Summary: In the aftermath of the Battle of New York, Loki is not returned to Asgard. Instead, he's handed over to Secretary Alexander Pierce, who is very interested in finding out exactly what use HYDRA can make of their new acquisition.





	Ground Beneath Your Skin

**Author's Note:**

> A whump prompt (from an anon that asked for "Don't pass out, we're almost there") that I started post-Endgame viewing that got a little out of a hand. (Shocking! Unusual!) It doesn't really have any Endgame spoilers.
> 
> As always, you can check out my [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/anamelessdragon) if you'd like to keep track of where I'm at with fic updates (this oneshot has kind of derailed my schedule currently) and to be inundated with marvel gifs.

In the end, despite Thor's words, Odin had barred Loki's return to Asgard, allowing the humans to take their revenge.

Bound by chains that Asgard had designed specifically for his capture, his tongue yet silenced by the muzzle, Loki could only seethe wordlessly in his new cell as the news was delivered to him by the man who called himself Secretary Alexander Pierce.

Pierce, who did not squander his opportunity for some jovial gloating. "From this day forward, you will not be considered a person. You are property, pure and simple, to be used until we've rung out of you every last bit of profitable data we can possibly uncover. In fact, we'll be leaving the muzzle on for the foreseeable future." 

A god contained by mortals. The humiliation of it burned him with hatred, but the venom of his words had been locked away by Thor, whose platitudes of brotherhood and entreaties of the lure of "home" Loki had finally driven to an end. 

He told himself he didn't care, that he was glad to have yet again proven Asgard's bleeding heart for the lie it was. 

Hands clamped over his arms and shoulders. Pierce stepped closer, and he seemed unbothered by the bored blankness that Loki presented to him.

"I want you to think about that," he said, staring into Loki's eyes. "There is nothing you can give us that will make your initial treatment better. Your thoughts and wants and needs are a _very_ distant second to our mission. We won't kill you, not intentionally - and eventually we'll give you the option to speak and work with us - but for now your maintenance and upkeep are going to be given the lowest bar of consideration possible. Your health and functionality are of even less concern to us than that of a filing cabinet."

The hands on Loki's shoulders attempted to pull him into movement.

He resisted.

His feet planted and his chin raised, Loki took full advantage of his superior physical strength to disallow any successful manhandling. 

Pierce did not appear surprised. "It's fine, leave him for now. We're in no rush." 

The guards filed out without a word. Loki's confusion must have shown on his face, because Pierce gave him a self-satisfied smile. "That was a test. Let me make it very clear - while what is going to happen will happen no matter what, defiance will not be tolerated. We'll get our way in the end, one way or another."

Loki was left in his cell, the multitudes of doors at its entrance slamming shut with audible locking mechanisms. He was in a facility deep beneath earth, his only companions in this new cage the barred lights and its six sides of smooth, silver metal. 

A deep humming noise came from above him. It started low, and then over the course of several seconds increased in intensity. 

There was a bright flash an instant before his world descended into agony.

It only lasted for a few moments, but Loki felt his heart struggle in the aftermath, the metal on his wrists and face searing with heat. He had to focus to stay standing, limbs tingling before his body recovered itself from the damage.

The humans had harnessed the power of electrical energy. It was a feeling that Loki knew well.

The hum began again.

_Scared of a little lightning?_

He shot his eyes to the ceiling, trying to search for where the attack would originate - he saw sparks begin to connect between the bars over the lights, before they lashed violently and exploded downwards to where he stood.

The strike sent him to one knee, creating another point of contact through which the energy could surge through him as his cell was transformed into one large, conductive box.

He sucked in air through his nostrils in the aftermath, reaching uselessly for his magic, trying to form a defensive shield - anything. But Asgard's bonds rendered him effectively helpless in that area.

He would see them all dead. Starting with Pierce and his men, and ending with the Avengers, he would find a way to bleed them all dry.

The hum began again.

He had nowhere to escape.

\-----------

The soldier had been prepped and given his mission outline. He awaited further orders from his handlers.

"Pierce says to put him back in."

"What? But we just finished defrosting protocol."

"There's not going to be anything ready for a while. He's taking personal responsibility over the new subject. Wants to see if he can't engineer another asset in the process."

"Wish he would have told us this morning."

"Just fucking do it. Blend his head and put him back on the shelf."

"All right. Asset, lean back."

\-----------

_Pain. Pain. Pain._

The wrath of suffering scoured his body, an eternity of jolting fire that formed again, and again, and again. 

When it stopped, and Loki's fractured mind regained sense enough to notice, he could taste the copper of blood coating his mouth and tongue.

The door to his cell was opened, but he could not rise. His muscles quivered and twitched as a result of the torture, his heart still erratic from the repeated assaults. The flesh in contact with the metal of his bonds was seared with agony, and the cell stunk of lingering ozone and burnt leather from the weaker points of his armor.

Bodies gathered around him and clinically cut through what was left, maneuvering him like a ragdoll as they peeled away layer after layer, until he was left bare on the metal floor. Then, before he had even begun to recover movement, large buckets of water were upended over him.

He was left alone again.

The humming returned.

_Pain._

\----------

When they next came for Loki, it was to begin their experiments. He might have played weakness and exhaustion to fool them if it hadn't been the absolute truth of his condition. 

He hated even more that he could not control the quickening of his breaths as he was taken to a great reclining metal chair and bound in place, magnetic restraints clamped about his limbs and neck, a wide belt anchoring him firmly at his pelvis. The chair moved until he was supine and stretched out, the scientists speaking for long minutes as if he was nothing more than a beast.

Lights were positioned around him, blazingly bright and he could not turn away. After some time he began to regain his ability to move, and he strained at his bonds.

"Please," Pierce said, his voice coming from somewhere above Loki. "We have containment units designed to withstand the Hulk - did you think we wouldn't have something that could hold _you_?"

He stepped into Loki's sight, tapping at the thick band that encircled his wrist above Asgard's manacles. "Actually, these were partially designed using remnants from the Destroyer armor. Very interesting, the materials you work with in space."

Loki rolled his eyes and turned his gaze aside, blocking out the man's tirade, even if he was nearly shuddering with fury. If he'd been allowed to speak he might have spoken a jab asking if Secretary Pierce spent much of his time speaking with filing cabinets, for in contrast to the scientists, _he_ seemed to be approaching every interaction with Loki with quite the heaping of dialogue.

Hands began to swab at the flesh of his belly with something cold and wet. Loki tensed, trying and failing to get a clear look at what was happening.

"Just a thorough examination for this first session," Pierce said. "Note any electrical damage. Find out how he works."

"Yes, sir."

A hand patted Loki's chest with insouciant care. "It's a good thing you're a lot more durable than you look."

 _They cannot truly touch you,_ Loki told himself. _You are a god, you survived the Void and what came after and are all the more stronger for it. This is only one more setback to endure. Have patience. They will pay._

There was an insistent chime from a second voice - a quote from memory. _You lack conviction._

When their instruments tore into his flesh and gloved hands began to pull him apart, his screams remained trapped behind Asgardian metal.

\----------

The soldier had been prepped and given his mission outline. He awaited further orders from his handlers.

"We've got something, but Pierce is sending it to List."

"You're kidding me."

"He doesn't want to risk compromising the asset with a space pathogen before some more thorough tests are done."

"He can't get sick! Zola's notes-"

"Zola agrees with this plan. He knows the ins and outs of the asset's body better than any of us."

"List already has the cube. I don't see why he should get this, too."

"Look, you wanna complain, talk to Pierce."

"Damn it. Don't know why we even bother. Lean back, asset."

\----------

The days bled together. At times they returned Loki to his cell, giving him rest from the nauseating violation of their curious hands by submitting him to the inhuman cruelty of the lightning strikes.

If he was difficult, they kept him pliable by not allowing him more than a few minutes between electrocutions, exhausting him well beyond all ability to fight. If he was not, they allowed enough time between shocks that he was able to find rest in small spurts.

Sometimes he simply fell unconscious no matter their intent, and discovered which of those two he would experience when he woke.

When he could think, he _hated,_ though increasingly such thoughts became mired in the creeping tendrils of black despair. Pain gnawed at him without respite, haunting his every moment and plaguing his body unendingly. The cracks in his mind began to spread, a howling for a relief that went unanswered.

He grew thinner, almost entirely sustained by the nutrients they stabbed into him while he was bound upon the table. Sometimes they forced a tube through his nose and down his throat, filling his stomach - usually when they only planned to perform mild external tests, so they would not risk the induction of vomiting.

He'd begun to scar more visibly as his ability to heal from their scalpels and saws and whatever damaging substances they saw fit to pour over him slowed over time. Arcing dark marks coursed over his skin from the tortures of his cell, branching patterns of the lightning's path darkening pale flesh. His vision had begun to grow progressively blurred, and the strength of his hearing slowly faded. 

The time required for the recovery of his senses after being dragged from his cell stretched to hours and beyond. At times even his nerves became damaged enough that parts of him would be numbed to the torment he experienced. 

But it was never enough.

"Incredible," Pierce said one day of his body's healing capabilities, after a particularly long absence between visits. "And all this without access to that voo-doo you use."

Loki hated most of all that he had begun to almost crave seeing the man - for all that he'd dragged Loki into this prison, he was the only one who spoke to him instead of over him, gave him any indication of the knowledge that he was more than just a body for their research. 

He soon realized - _that was the point._

They'd spent an eternity of a session cutting into his bones to test regeneration rates and sample his marrow. When he was thrown back into his cell, he curled in the center, as he always did, attempting to keep the least amount of flesh in contact with the floor. As if it would make a difference when the electrostatic discharge locked up his muscles.

It took him a long time to realize that no shocks were forthcoming.

Confusion seeped through his mind, but he did not move. There was no point, and he was damaged enough already that he did not want to risk more by climbing to his feet only to be knocked down when his captors remembered to reinstate his normal treatment.

But then the cell door opened. 

Pierce entered, followed by the scent of something fragrant that sent his starved stomach into plaintive rumbles. There were guards around him, different from the scientists - soldiers dressed in black and armed with a variety of weapons. The majority of them regarded Loki with postures of barely contained violence.

They placed a chair near the entrance of the cell, and a table beside it upon which they set a plate of steaming food. 

A cautious hand reached for Loki and he lurched away, nostrils flaring and hands curling. 

"Easy, fella," was spoken over him.

The urge for violence sparked, so strong it stole his breath. _Do not touch me._

The tension in the room rose. Weapons raised and directed his way. He wanted to tear out their throats.

 _And then what? Be calm,_ he told himself. _This is a change, a chance to exploit. Allow them to think you are beaten._ It took time, but eventually his desperate anger withered enough that he could think beyond it.

Pierce had settled himself down into the chair. He was watching Loki's reaction carefully. "We'll remove the muzzle, now, if you'll let us."

Hands closed in again and this time Loki was still, though he thrummed with aversion. He felt the click as the abhorrent device unlatched and was pulled away. His skin sang with new pain as that part of his face was exposed to air for the first time since his capture, but the absence of the constant chafe and rub against his skin was still a welcome relief. He licked his tingling and blistered lips, though he had little moisture to spare.

"Wh-" His throat closed before he was able to form a full word and he coughed violently, every damaged bone sending splinters of agony through him at the convulsive movement. 

A plastic cup filled with ice was placed in front of him as he recovered. 

"Try that," Pierce said, satisfaction thick on his tongue. "Take your time. And then we can talk."

Loki did not move, his eyes gauging the men surrounding him with their stiffened backs and distrustful glowers. Only Pierce held an easy and relaxed pose, hands folded together in front of himself, face open.

Loki did not know what this new interaction would entail. He suspected he would find out soon enough.

The ice was a balm on his throat, and the opportunity to taste something besides his own blood and bile was heavenly. He wasn't fooled - he knew this was the comfort to follow the agony, the ingratiation after the torture. For a half a moment he wondered if they had considered sending in Romanoff when they made their plans for his treatment.

Still, he could not deny his anguish. And neither could he ignore the kernel of hope that formed that maybe he could convince them that he was completely broken and would willingly, eagerly fall to their side. To grant himself opening for escape.

"You've been with us for months, now," Pierce said. A vague timeline, and one that afforded Loki no real knowledge of the world beyond his prison. "We've learned a lot of useful information from your body. I thought we might begin to move on to your mind." He leaned back in his seat, gesturing to the plate on the table. "If I like what you have to say, I'll leave the food with you and you can have a full night of uninterrupted sleep. Get some of your strength back up."

The kind words, the lie of a facade - Pierce told Loki the absolute truth of wanting to use him while at the same time made it seem as if such an action was a much-coveted honor. 

Ridiculous. Another humiliation deserving of his ire. Any Asgardian warrior worth his salt would have refused them, withstood their tortures with prowess and an honorable and unwavering determination.

But Loki knew very well, now - he was no Asgardian. 

What he was, was trapped in a pit. And he would bloody his hands on this barbed rope that was lowered down to him if it meant eventually he survived to leave everything far behind.

\-----------

Pierce asked about the Chitauri army. He asked about the scepter. He asked about the Tesseract. 

Loki forced himself to bite back words of hate and vitriol, to control the fear and ravenous hunger that thrummed within him - he summoned every ounce of smoothness he could manage, and he smiled through cracked lips, and he acted as if Pierce was a long-awaited friend who had come to delight him with his companionship. As if he did not feel the constant ache of yet-unhealed chemical burns scarring over his organs.

When they were done, at least, Pierce seemed satisfied with Loki's answers.

"We'll give you a night to yourself," Pierce said, rising from his chair. "And then we'll resume the normal experiments."

Loki felt his lungs seize, the urge to fight, to _kill_ again overbearing every other thought. To taste the sweetness of relief and then be denied its continuation - he would not, he _could not_ -

The urge for panicked violence filtered out of him like water through a sieve.

The sensation left him confused - it was as if his stores of rage, for survival, had simply used themselves up. He attempted to let none of this show on his face. 

But Pierce was still watching. 

Loki tried to gather himself, and colored his words with an engaging tone. "I could offer more, if my mind was not constantly assailed by electricity."

Pierce smiled as if Loki had told a particularly amusing jest. "The only negotiations that are going to be taking place will be instated by me and me alone. If you step out of line, you'll go back to full time lab rat for six months before we try again. This is your chance to do something useful for us. Don't waste it."

\----------

Two days later, as Pierce had promised, he was back in the chair. The muzzle had been replaced. His head was ringing from the lightning's cruel return, his thoughts loose like mulched earth and his limbs unresponsive.

The scientists worked as if they were making up for lost time, and whatever suspicions Loki had about this all being intensified to further cement his willingness to submit to Pierce's will was lost in violation and agony as they tore at him like a pack of wolves on a carcass, crushing bone and pulling free organs while he could do nothing but quiver and shriek and long for oblivion.

\----------

The soldier had been prepped and given his mission outline. He awaited further orders from his handlers.

"Rumlow, if you're here to tell me anything else other than 'we got it-'"

"Take it easy, doc. We got it."

"Thank god. Finally."

"But we're not going to use it yet. Pierce wants to put the project on hold for a few weeks."

"What? Why?"

"The scepter's working on the new subject. He's not going to have the time to devote his attention to both the Soldier and that alien asshole on top of SHIELD upkeep."

"Surprised he even remembers the asset at this point."

"He remembers. Really, doc, you gotta learn to roll with the punches."

"Yeah, yeah. Asset, lean back."

\----------

Pierce's voice came to Loki an indeterminate time later. He'd been returned to his cell twice to be burnt alive by electricity, and now was again in the hands of the scientists. They'd put poisons in his veins, and directly upon his organs, and dripped it into his eyes until the world had been seared from his sight.

"How long has he been in the chair?"

"Five days, sir."

Loki turned his head towards the sound of new approaching footsteps, nearly delirious with agony. He was nothing, only a vessel of meat and blood for them to prise apart, until Pierce came into the room.

A warm hand pressed against his face. He flinched, and then thought of Thor, beseeching him with brotherly love - Thor, who had damned him to this, and he did not know if it would be worse if he knew, or was ignorant of Loki's treatment. 

"The information you gave me the other day was very helpful. I was hoping we could have another talk sometime soon."

Loki made a noise against his muzzle. The hand left him and footsteps moved away. "Give him some extra time between shocks."

The treacherous relief that filled him paid no mind to his choking self-disgust.

\----------

 

A new routine began, one punctuated with a light in the midst of his torturous existence. Pierce's visits were still too far and few between, but Loki felt himself gaining ground in the man's favor even as he continued to sink down further into the folds of madness. 

He lost time. He lost _sense_.

He let himself withdraw completely in the moments when the scientists had him, only trying his hardest to keep focus and perform whenever Pierce returned.

He rationalized his control of the situation, when he could still think. It wasn't simple capitulation. He was a god - he could wait for years if it meant his escape. 

He did not know how long it had been since the Avengers had handed him over to their torturers and sadists. Perhaps it had already been years of repeated damage and regeneration, of silver walls and shackles and the complete desecration of his physical self. 

He wondered if the Avengers knew, if even now they thought on his downfall with glee. Or if, like his false family, they simply ceased to care once he was no longer their problem. 

Only after Pierce's visits was he given true respite. Once, he'd even managed to secure for himself three full days unmolested. At least, that was what he had been told. It seemed like much less, but it was not as if he had a way of detecting time.

The fact that he couldn't quite recall the information he'd offered to the man for such a luxury was worrying, but ultimately inconsequential.

\----------

The soldier had been prepped and given his mission outline. He awaited further orders from his handlers.

"Hey, doc. We're good to go."

"Where is it?"

"Here."

"Asset, present your right arm."

He complied. Sensation, a sting as a needle slid beneath his skin and was taped in place. Insignificant discomfort. He kept his body still and free of response.

A clear bag dripped dark fluid into a tube connected to the needle.

Then, restraints. A raw chill in his blood, building until it pierced sharply into bone and organ. 

The vitreous of his eyes froze solid. His self-control broke.

His howls were obstructed by the ice crystals that solidified in his throat.

\----------

When next Loki was locked into the chair, the scientists spoke with obvious excitement. It took several minutes before he regained enough of his hearing to make sense of their eager words.

"-did it. A serum that will cancel out the second-rate piss that Xola concocted back in the 40s."

"Did they test the soldier yet?"

"He's still adjusting. But homeostasis is returning at ten times the rate of any of List's subjects."

"Any permanent side effects?"

"Only some ocular albinism. Makes him look creepy as all hell, but there's no affect to his vision. Besides that and the projected increased physical strength and hardiness, he's still the same old asset."

Loki waited in mute dread for them to begin as they circled and spoke and pointed to their electronic devices. They drew blood from him, storing it with the numerous other samples they collected from his body. But their attention was distracted, and more than once they devolved into discussions of whatever this "asset" was instead of taking any time to bring out their drills and saws and needles. 

The waiting was almost worse. He flinched and sucked in breath with every movement and touch, the expectation keeping his mind torturously present, as if such knowledge would aid him when they finally decided which part of him they would experiment upon next.

He was shaking by the time they left him, their excitement growing as they left to view whatever it was they had crafted from his stolen blood and tissue. The guards did not return to unlock him from the chair.

After an indeterminate amount of time, his thoughts finally loosened their iron grip on his dread. He stared at the ceiling, relishing in the lack of pain. There was a sensation like an itch on his forehead. He pulled listlessly at his restraints, wishing he could soothe it.

He dozed until the quiet was disrupted by the return of several of the scientists. They spoke loudly and with giddiness. The scent of alcohol filtered inwards as an additional herald of their arrival. 

One of them nearly stumbled into him on approach, a hand pressed against Loki's chest. The touch did not cease even when its owner realized its placement.

What followed was less painful than having his abdomen split open or the marrow pulled from his bones. That didn't stop the sound of their laughter from haunting his nightmares.

\-----------

They had placed the soldier back in cryostasis. He could feel ice conformed to every part of his body. 

It did not feel cold. It felt like...home.

His forehead itched.

Nearby, someone was screaming. No, not nearby. Closer than that. Inside...his head? 

There were emotions that were not his own. He focused, and they became torrential. _Pain. Violation. Stop stop stop stop-_

Confusion stirred in the soldier's mind. _Who are you?_

No answer but the screams. 

When they faded, he was alone.

\-----------

"Let's talk about your brother."

Loki darted his gaze up. Something ugly writhed within him, piercing the usual exhaustion. "What would you like to know?"

"He controls the weather."

Loki rubbed at the persistent itch in his forehead, a factor that he was beginning to take as yet another manifestation of the return of his madness. "Somewhat. It's a useless trick."

"So it comes from him, not the hammer."

"Yes, though the hammer is required for much of its control."

"And what are his intentions with Earth?"

"He is quite fond of Earth," Loki said, feeling the increasing stirring of that familiar rage. "Enough to sacrifice himself for the love of one of its humans."

"Jane Foster," Pierce said. "Our reports say he'd only known her for three days before that event."

"Yes," Loki said, grinding his teeth. 

Only three days before Thor had returned to Asgard a changed man. Permanently, to the point that when he'd been sent to retrieve the Tesseract from Loki he had acted shocked and dismayed when Loki had proclaimed the humans beneath them, as if _Thor_ had not been raised to believe _the precise same thing,_ as if the humans, his precious fellow Avengers, had not been the same as all the others, when they had all danced like _puppets_ to the power of the scepter-

Loki faltered, blinking as his anger melted away once again. 

No. Not melted, he realized. _Taken._

_You are a fool._

Pierce did not discount the lengthy pause. "Is there a problem?"

Loki looked up, and let out a breath of laughter to keep his guards at ease. "Simply...gathering my thoughts."

_Think. If you allow them to know, you will lose what little ground you have made._

_And what use will such favor mean for your escape if by the end you are no more than a slave to their whims?_

_It does not matter. Either way, your mind is lost._

The sweetness of the first neck breaking beneath his grip was tempered to such a degree that he felt almost nothing. Bullets tore into him and their shock sticks pressed into his vulnerable flesh and still he fought to crush and claw and thrash.

Four were dead before he was subdued, and a greater number of them maimed.

He panted on the ground, pinned on his back by magnetic cuffs, blood from both his own injuries and those of his guards spread thick on his skin. There was an itch in his mind, and he viciously tried to fight it off now that he knew it for what it was. Someone stamped their boot against his face in response to the movement - one of the men that had escaped with his life but not without injury.

Pierce approached, a look of frustrated disappointment on his face. "Loki, Loki. I thought we had an understanding."

"We do now," Loki said, tasting blood and pasting on a grin that he did not feel. "You are clearly - incapable of understanding such power."

"Oh, I think we'll get better at it. You were only our first test subject, after all." He sighed, hands on his belt. "Damn, and I really thought we were getting somewhere."

Loki laughed, reckless as he felt the satisfaction of the upper hand in his possession for the first time since being doomed to this hole, however slight the advantage. "You reach too far, to think _you_ can control _me._ I do hope your failure tastes as bitter as it looks."

Someone shoved the muzzle against Loki's lips. He tossed his head, but the metal had already reached and gripped into the back of his skull.

Pierce's voice remained calm, but his eyes were angry. "I'm afraid I have a timeframe on another project that means I can't afford to wait for you to come around. The value of your mind is officially negligible at this point. Your body, however - we've found wonders there. I honestly should be thanking you. In fact, maybe I'll come back here in a year or so to revisit our discussion. See if you've changed your tune after we've hollowed you out."

They left him pinned like an insect against the metal floor as they left. When the familiar humming started up, ominous and loud, he shut his eyes against tears of rage and uselessly braced himself.

The lightning ripped through him.

\-----------

The soldier felt that he was falling. He saw the face of someone he knew, crying out as they reached for him.

Then a flash, and he could hear the whir of saws. Sparks filled the periphery of his vision. _No._

Rage. His fist lashed out to pulp tissue and crunch bone. A body went flying.

A dozen sights aligned on him, hammers ready to fall. He could smell their fear. It would not affect their accuracy. 

_Stand down, asset._

He did not care. He was seeing the man on the bridge, hearing his voice.

The room was too warm.

"The cryostasis isn't working. And he's been - regenerating at an incredible rate."

"But that was expected."

"Not to this extent. He's been _awake in the ice_. It's making him more erratic than ever. The instability alone this will create if we can't put him under-"

"Move." Footsteps approached. "Mission report."

_Bucky?_

Screaming filled his mind. Not his own, and not from memory. It was the Other that was with him in the vault.

"Mission report, now."

The itch in his head grew stronger.

\-----------

_Pain. Pain. Pain._

The cell. The chair. The cell. The chair.

Then, the cell. The cell for a very long time. He convulsed on the ground, scarred and burnt, brain and heart helpless against the constant surges, over and over and over. Thought was obliterated until suffering was all that was, and all that ever would be. 

_Pain._

Then, at some point, the shocks just...stopped.

The mass of body that was Loki did not move. He did not think.

_Noise. Cold air._

_Movement._

There was sensation - a boot nudged against his ribs. 

_Pain. New pain._

_No. Let me die._

Cold metal pressed against the side of his head. The stimuli brought some of his mind back beyond the flashes of primal urges of terror.

There was a blurred shape, dark and tall, with a flash of bright silver. He thought he smelled blood. His sight was almost gone, but he imagined the metal shape pressed against him was a gun.

A small spark of hope entered - that now, his wretched existence would finally end.

Speech came, but muffled, as if his ears had been clogged with cotton. A man's voice. "It's you. Who are you?"

Loki felt like he'd been asked that question before, but he did not know why. The itch returned along with it, but now it was even stronger, and a sense of confusion overlayed upon his own. Impressions, emotions - disjointed thoughts that were not his.

 _Do I know you?_ Loki could not tell which of them had thought that. Perhaps both.

The stance of the blurred shape faltered. There was a quick lashing movement.

Thought and sight faded.

\----------

Loki woke in a bed in a frigid and dimly lit room.

The sensation was so alien that it nearly frightened him, something other than cold metal cushioning him in the first time for as long as he could remember. His mind was slow and his limbs felt sluggish.

He turned his head and ignored the pain of movement, seeking information with his impaired vision. A small bedroom, fairly dilapidated, except for the large silver case that sat on a table against the wall. It drew his gaze, a pinpoint of shining metal that stoked familiarity. Though he struggled to make sense of it, he could not remember why.

The muzzle had been removed from his face. Asgard's manacles had been broken from his wrists, but his magic was sapped dry for anything other than fruitless stabilization of his health.

He startled as a flash of liquid silver came from across the room, making him realize he was not alone. He could make out the shape of a man - the silver attached was...an arm? The man's back was curved forward and he held the hand of the strange limb against his forehead, unheeding of his observer. As Loki watched, he reached for something that sat next to him and made movements in short jerks with feverish intensity. 

Questions flashed in through the pounding of Loki's head. _Where am I? Who are you? What do you intend?_

But he was not awake long enough to ask them.

\----------

There were new lines on the soldier's forehead. The _itch,_ that damn itch, made him want to pull the skin from his face to make it stop. He hadn't slept in days. If he went much longer without rest he projected that his performance would become sub-optimal.

He should have left the Other behind. Travel speed was greatly impaired with a burden of that level, and he wasn't equipped for caretaking. Didn't know the protocol for medical care of an alien entity.

But what was in the case that he'd stolen from HYDRA connected them. He wanted to know why. 

\----------

Loki was moved to a new location. He woke, again sluggish, this time recognizing the signs from SHIELDs drugs - the kind that thankfully numbed everything, instead of the paralytics that they used to ensure he felt everything as they tortured him.

Movement to his side had him flinching violently, awakening the aches in his own body. He waited for the touch of their hands and instruments, for the restraints to clamp cruelly over his limbs and neck, or to be dragged back to the steady hell of the lightning that awaited him between metal walls.

A glass of water was placed on the nightstand beside his head, breaking him of some of his panic. He turned to look - his sight had improved, along with his hearing. The liquid within the glass was not pure, sediment floating through the liquid, some sort of round tab dissolving at its base.

His mysterious champion stood beside the bed, eyes of a brilliant icy blue staring unblinkingly down at him. "Who are you?" 

The blunt tone sent terror sliding down Loki's spine. Even now that he had been freed, his magic was so depleted by its focus on healing that even the simplest of cantrips would be beyond his abilities. 

His voice when he spoke was unrecognizably hoarse. "I might ask the same of you."

There was silence. Then, "I don't know."

Well, this was a stirring conversation. "You killed my captors," Loki said, needing to know.

The eyes watched him unwaveringly, bright points that remained clear in Loki's vision despite its impairment. A burst of vague satisfaction brushed against Loki's mind.

"Skeleton crew," the man said. "Easy pickings."

"You are an enemy of SHIELD?"

"What the hell is SHIELD?" 

Perhaps his relief had been premature. "The people that held me," Loki said.

"HYDRA." The man's voice had hardened. "Did they put you in a chair, too? Lie to you, make you forget?"

Loki froze, his throat closing up as he remembered their hands invading every part of him, either for their science or - during the times when he was left "pretty" enough - carnal recreation. 

"Yes," he answered. "You said only a skeleton crew remained. Alexander Pierce, is he-"

"Dead. Not by me." The metal hand was curling into a fist. The feeling of vague satisfaction was clouded by disappointment.

Loki attempted to sit up, every inch of him protesting and his head, in particular, making a mess of his concentration. The body beside him straightened at his movement, every line going deliberately still. Loki froze in kind, suddenly very aware of the increase in noises coming from the artificial limb.

A feedback loop of tension began in his mind, and he was present enough now to note the fact that not all of the feelings were his alone. It was like an impression of a hand's indentation on a pillow of down. He wondered if his rescuer was something like a telepath.

He settled back, staring at the cracks in the paint on the ceiling above him and trying not to feel overly concerned at the fact that his vision was still incredibly blurred when he tried to see at a distance. 

And there were other things - things he'd forgotten, that he was sure he needed to know. But he could not find them.

The room was very cold.

Some of the tension faded, the loop of caution disrupted at his inoffensive position. 

Loki sighed, letting go as exhaustion filled him, a different kind of dullness that brought a sting to his eyes. "And what do you want with me?"

He saw a shrug in his periphery. "Kinda thought you'd be dead by now."

Loki almost laughed at the absurdity of it, then felt the press of tears strengthen and he could not stop them, could only curl on his side and hide his face as he took air in stuttered breaths, until his head pounded with more than dehydration and hunger and he again faded from consciousness.

\----------

There was a new routine. 

Loki would fall unconscious as his body scrabbled to cobble together what healing it could manage, and then he would wake again. His companion, if he could be called that, mostly kept to himself, though he remained as agitated by Loki's presence as Loki was by his. 

Sometimes they would move locations. Loki was never awake for this, and would often come around with a fog-like feeling. He was sure he was being drugged, but could not bring himself to ask for confirmation, for fear that he would be driven to a fight he would likely lose.

He was still in New York. His rescuer had informed him of that fact after he had finally done some research to find that SHIELD (and HYDRA) was in shambles, enough to not worry about being followed in any concerning capacity as long as they were careful.

"Then from what do you run?" Loki asked, because while he remained exhausted and terrified, the cycle of emotions projecting psychically from the human were those of a person being hunted. 

The stubble on the man's face was thicker, one of Loki's only clear indications of the passage of time since their escape. His piercing eyes were directed at the floor. "Someone I used to know."

He'd left the room after that, evidently not wanting to continue on such a thread.

When Loki next slept, he dreamed of Captain America, broken and bleeding beneath him.

\----------

Still no mission. 

Instead, there were thoughts, and feelings, and pictures that felt like memories. He catalogued them, carefully, trying to organize them for sense, often discarding the trail in frustration. 

Growing pain in his head impaired his performance, mentally and physically. He felt far too warm most of the time. Cold water from a shower provided a brief relief.

The drugs he'd stolen helped to minimize his discomforts. Once, the Other had seen him self-administering a dose and then fallen retching off the side of the bed. He kept his injections hidden from that point.

The Other was fragile, and spent most of the time sleeping to heal. He did not seem to know about the case or its contents. 

There were many moments of quiet now. Often he felt adrift without the maintenance of his handlers. 

Who was he?

_Your name is James Buchanan Barnes._

\----------

Loki was able to stand with enough steadiness eventually, though the loose clothing that had been pulled over his lower half was nearly lost in the process.

They were yet again in a new place - a hotel room this time, small and smelling of mildew. There was, as always, only a single bed - he never saw his companion take rest, but sometimes he had noticed a lone pillow would be placed on the floor in some corner. Always within the line of sight of the door. 

There was a mirror on the wall. He approached it slowly, wincing as he caught sight of the emaciated ruin of his own body, bones far too pronounced, every patch of visible skin covered by the scarring of electrical damage, winding tendrils of a grotesque tree that painted his flesh. 

His eyes, though, were what he struggled through blurred sight to focus on. Both had pale and thickened lines that formed connecting angles around the pupils, like the outline of a many-pointed star. 

Unhealed scarring, that disrupted the quality of his vision.

There was a cry and a crash from the bathroom. Loki jerked, and heard an angry, bitten-off curse. He waited in tense silence until the bathroom door opened and his companion rushed out and towards a large black bag set beneath the table, bared skin gleaming wet as he crouched and reached inside. 

He pulled free a syringe. The liquid within crystallized instantly, the cover frosting over. 

But what concerned Loki was the fact that the man's eyes were changed, the icy blue now backdropped by a ruby red. 

Loki skittered backwards until the wall met his back, cursing himself for an idiot, because he should have _known_ , he remembered this much - the scientists carving his body had all but told him directly. A serum, that they had created from the cells they had taken from his tissue and blood. 

The savage blood of a Frost Giant.

The changing creature finally seemed to notice his audience, and he breathed out through his nostrils as he shoved the bag towards Loki. "I need you to inject me."

Loki felt his gorge rise at the prospect of touching the syringes or that - that _thing._

At his lack of movement, a hand lashed out and grabbed his wrist, stronger than Loki's current state. An icy chill quickly radiated up his arm like the sting of a blizzard.

Loki snarled. "Let go. Do not _touch_ me!"

It was too late. Like a terrible deja vu, Loki saw his pale flesh mottle and turn, deep blue creeping up his forearm, staining his nails darker. And his attacker - staring at him with eyes of Jotun-red, faint ridges becoming more pronounced on his skin, watched the change with confusion and dawning realization.

The air from the creature's breath created yet more chill. "Who are you?"

In answer, Loki wrenched free. "It is better if you stay ignorant."

Red eyes narrowed. "The hell it is." 

A gun was directed at Loki in a rage. It just as immediately froze over, ice forming wildly in accordance with its host's anger.

The weapon was discarded with a frustrated curse. Loki could feel emotions, desperation clouding confusion, a mind adrift and without memory searching for an anchor. _Tell me,_ they said. _Tell me I'm not alone._

"You're the same as me," the creature tried.

"No, I am not," Loki hissed. "We have no connection beyond that they made you _from_ me, from the blood that they wrenched from my veins. And it looks like they did a rather poor job."

A shiver came from the changed form. It paced in agitation, the silver limb gleaming brighter against the contrast of blue. "Can't fucking think. I just need an injection."

"And then what? Your supply is finite." Loki took another step back. "You are a beast. You killed your masters."

The pacing body lurched at him in sudden violence. A blue hand grasped at his neck and slammed him against the wall, holding firm to influence the change of Loki's skin. He felt the ridges raise along his face, and the temperature of the room was suddenly far too warm as his body became something that was more adapted to life in a world of ice.

"You're like me," the creature reiterated, the edges of his voice shaking.

Disgust curdled in a despairing tangle in Loki's gut. It was not enough that he'd had his body and his mind toyed with for - however long - now even the appearance of his body could be forced different at will.

The hand released him, his attacker moving away. "We need to move. I broke the shower. Fucking stupid." Feverish hands worked to dress and pack, leaving traces of uncontrolled frost over everything they touched. "Need to find a disguise."

Loki hesitated, unable to help the fear that prodded at him insistently at the idea of being outside, exposed, risking recapture.

Red eyes glanced up at him. "I can knock you out."

Loki did not bother to wonder how the creature could tell what he was feeling. "Is that an offer or a threat?"

The only answer was the pile of clothing thrown at his feet.

\---------

This was pointless. Loki stared out the window of the car and knew that they could only run so far - they'd driven for hours. Gloves had helped some of the issues from the ice of the unruly hybridization of Jotun and human blood beside him, but there seemed to now be a new deterioration occurring in his companion - shivers, a glazed look, the frequent grinding of teeth.

And beyond that, Loki kept receiving mental impressions with increasing clarity, of a man uniformed in white and blue, along with an anxiety and sickness that was not his own. 

"You run from Captain America," Loki said. 

Red eyes whipped towards him, the disconnect of someone else's emotions a pulse beneath Loki's skin. 

Loki gave a bitter smile at the awful coincidence. "The Avengers were the ones who handed me over to your masters."

Shock colored the creature's tone. "He _what?_ "

"You have him to thank for your new appearance."

Their car was pulled to the side of the empty road. Boots crunched into rock and detritus in rapid steps, and there was the sound of vomiting.

His companion returned to the car. He did not speak again as they sped back into the night. 

\-----------

Their next stop was not a hotel room. They made camp inside a large and empty white building, the interior of which was a bare space only filled with ceiling supports. 

The floor was grey, and held enough of a shine to its surface that Loki's heart seized with terror at the sight of it and he suddenly could not take in a breath.

The creature watched him blankly, standing just inside with his hand around the handle of the large silver case he carried, his black bag slung over his shoulder. He then ignored Loki as he ventured in deeper.

Loki briefly considered waiting outside. Then he imagined being found free by Captain America, or Thor, or any of the other Avengers. His vision was still too poor to see much beyond that which was near to him - he would not notice an attack until it was far too late. Even now the image of his companion was being distorted as he moved too far into the building to see clearly.

Loki lurched inside and onto the surface. It felt different enough from the metal of his cell that his instinctive fear finally calmed enough for him to follow closely to his companion.

\-----------

The night was long. The creature was still undergoing mutations - the stubble that had been on his face had now disappeared completely, though the shoulder length hair remained. The Jotun-ridges grew more pronounced on his forehead, and he raked his hands over them irritably, the echo of the itch reflecting in Loki's senses.

Had Loki possessed that same pattern of ridges? He did not recall if he had ever even seen them. But then, he did not recall much beyond the battle that had lead to his defeat.

His companion held a small notepad in his lap, and every so often his body would make a seizing movement before he scribbled down anything from a single word to entire pages of text.

"You told me that they had made you forget," Loki said, wincing at the echo of his voice in the open space, too loud.

A sharp nod answered him. The blue color on his companion's face had lost some of its richness, and he twitched as Loki felt the growing sensation of returning nausea echo briefly through his mind. 

"There was a chair. Electric."

Loki swallowed. _Scared of a little lightning?_

"I could hear you screaming," the creature said, and shivered. 

"Yes," Loki said, feeling the dullness return along with the pinprick of tears. "There was rather a lot of that."

\----------

The soldier's head no longer itched. Instead, it pounded like a blast injury.

While the Other slept, he sought the cooler breezes of the exterior of the building. 

He could not stop shaking. Performance was sub-optimal. Performance was - _oh._

Emesis was severely impaired by conflicting core temperatures. The molecular composition of his body was changing even now. 

Ice formed and shattered on his skin, glittering in flaked shards against the ground.

A branch snapped in the distance.

He shot his attention towards it - sloppy. While his attention was drawn there was the loud crack of several shotguns behind him, and taser slugs pierced into his back. Muscle paralysis was quick to follow.

\-----------

Loki woke to the sound of gunfire and then struggle, hissed words and strained grunts.

Terror filled him; he was alone inside the building. He searched desperately, cursing himself for not demanding a weapon.

The creature's silver case was positioned against the wall.

He scrambled towards it, unlocking the container and ready to use whatever mediocre mortal instrument of death lay within.

He pushed it open. His eyes widened with shock.

 _Of course,_ he thought. _The creature is no telepath. It's you. It has always been you that connects us._

He began to titter.

The scepter gleamed with glorious gold. It felt like home in his grasp.

\-----------

They turned their weapons on Loki when he exited the warehouse, but he drew on the scepter's energy and easily deflected their projectiles. 

The first crunch as the pointed edge shattered through a sternum like brittle porcelain was music to his ears. He sliced open another of them from stem to stern, a poetic end in screams and exposed viscera. A third he beheaded. 

Some of them tried to run. They did not make it far. 

He stood panting when he was done, his weakness returning. The scepter was a formidable form of protection, but it did not erase the damage and suffering that weakened him. 

He still wished that their deaths had not quite come so quickly.

His companion remained unconscious on the ground with several strange tube-like protrusions penetrating into his back. Loki knocked them away before he stared down at the Jotun-tarnished human.

It would have been easy enough to send him into death, to the same fate as all the rest. It would have even been a kindness. A mercy, to spare him the suffering that living like this would prolong.

_I thought the exact same thing when I found you._

Loki jerked back at the voice in his mind. The body laboriously rolled onto its back before red eyes opened; they watched him warily.

"Can really hear you now," the creature said, nodding at the scepter. "I tried to destroy it when I figured out what it was doing, what it could do. Didn't work."

"Do you know who I am?" Loki asked, raising his chin.

"No, since you never told me," the creature answered with a shrug. "But now I know it's because you don't know, either."

Loki hesitated. He searched his mind, but his memories were sparse. He remembered a battle, and a great anger. He remembered the Avengers standing victorious above him. Before that there was a golden palace, and an icy wasteland of a planet where he found his true form.

Anything else, beyond the chair and the cell...was a grey haze. 

The realization, coupled with the knowledge the scepter brought that _there should be more_ , chilled him deeper than the blizzards of Jotunheim. He only just managed to keep himself standing. 

"Our captors would have had information," Loki said, looking about them at the dead bodies.

"I destroyed everything in the base where we were kept."

"Might we find more of them elsewhere?"

There was a flash of something in the red eyes - interest beyond the sickly feeling. "Yeah."

"Then, when the two of us are a bit more - recovered, I would propose a plan. To rediscover ourselves."

"Thought I was just a beast."

Loki reached down and grasped into a blue arm. The biting cold leeched up his palm as he helped his companion to stand on unsteady legs. 

"Perhaps," he said, keeping his eyes carefully from his own changed skin. "But you're _my_ beast now, aren't you?"

Red eyes widened. "I won't be anyone's slave. Not again."

"And neither will I. We have a common goal; to wipe anyone associated with your masters off the face of the planet."

A pause. Loki could feel the appeal of the idea to his companion echo through the scepter via the link of their shared blood. 

"Not Steve," the creature said. 

An impression formed in Loki's mind before he could ask - Captain America, standing conflicted at the edge of a bridge.

One of the humans that had handed him over to suffer and torment.

"I will not look for him," Loki said. "But if he shows himself, I promise nothing."

\----------

They hunted. 

Once Loki's companion's full transformation had completed, he proved himself an able and vicious warrior, if somewhat overly efficient. He did not approve of all of Loki's methods, and especially not the extended blood and pain that came with the desire for revenge. But he followed him like a soldier follows their king, his protests only manifesting in quick kills of those with whom Loki had deigned to devise more creative ends when his magic was finally able to make its joyous return. 

Their current target was well fortified, with an energy barrier and ground troops that numbered in the hundreds. A HYDRA research facility that had survived the downfall of SHIELD, to remain hidden in Sokovia.

Loki could not wait to tear it to pieces. 

He moved fluidly through space, seeking that which called to him. Invisible to the eye he ventured among the humans, villains who had not yet learned from the mistakes of their allies. 

In a room of Chitauri corpses and weapons, he found what he sought. 

The Tesseract glowed brightly enough to be visible at a distance even to his damaged eyes. He moved towards it and felt pride follow as it slid into his grasp.

 _I have it,_ he thought, sending the message through the scepter.

 _Good,_ came the response. _I was getting kinda bored._

Loki grinned and teleported back. His companion, who now insisted on the name of Bucky, crouched in the snow behind a rock ridge, wearing goggles and muzzle-like mask to hide his appearance. Every inch of the rest of him was layered in armor and varied weapons, and the snow-covered ground that surrounded them soothed the discomfort from being too warmly clothed that usually echoed through their link.

"Seems rather pointless," Loki commented of the several guns and knives ready for use. 

"Not all of us can use magic," Bucky responded.

"You were changed with my blood. Perhaps if you'd put even an ounce of an effort into it, you could learn."

"I'm not arguing this shit with you again. Guns and blunt force work well _and_ they draw less attention in a battle than one of your light shows. Just because you can't see that green crap very well doesn't mean everyone else can't."

"That sounded a bit like an argument."

He knew there was an eye roll hidden behind those dark lenses. "Are we going in or what?"

There was the sound of revving vehicles in the distance, fast approaching. Bucky tensed and Loki folded over him, keeping them both out of sight as the revving grew louder and then two people, distinctly not HYDRA, sped by in a stolen vehicle. 

The Avengers had come.

"Well," Loki breathed, flippancy masking his nervousness. "It appears someone else will be drawing all of the attention for today."

There was a trail of light in the air above as Iron Man flew towards the fortress. An ominous roar in the distance and the echoes of crashing signaled the arrival of the Hulk. 

Captain America came careening past on a motorcycle, fast out of sight. Bucky stared after him long after the noise of his vehicle faded into the distance.

It was at that point that the first of the lightning crackled down from the air.

Loki froze, the rest of the world suddenly seeming very far away. A dull thump pounded in his ears. His eyes desperately scanned the trees that surrounded them, limbs suddenly feeling too weak to support him. His vision remained too poor to see at a distance but he could _smell_ it, the ozone, it would come and it would tear through his skin and boil his blood and brain leave nothing but a ruin in his mind-

Ice.

Loki reared back in confusion as the feeling of ridges raising on his skin distracted him with instinctive disgust. Bucky dropped the frost-covered hand that had been pressed against Loki's cheek, reapplying his glove. 

"You back with me?"

Loki breathed heavily, feeling far too ill. "Thank you." He cleared his throat of some of its lingering tightness. "What do you say to joining them? In secret, of course."

Bucky's usual agreement for the opportunity for violence was absent. "I'd say it's a fucking bad idea. For both of us."

"Think of it as insurance. They are less likely to turn us over to HYDRA if every single member of the organization is dead."

"I told you, that's not what the Avengers do."

"It is what they _did_ ," Loki hissed. 

"Say we fucking do. What happens when you get close to Thor?"

Thor.

The thought was...dizzyingly unpleasant. Especially since there was a whole host of emotional attachments there, the sources of which Loki had too little identifiable basis. He feared what he would uncover if he went tugging on that lead.

_Scared of a little lightning?_

He shut his eyes. Imagined it, the God of Thunder standing before him, seeing his once-brother and now enemy loose and wreaking havoc. Then there would be the hammer, and more lightning, and even with the scepter Loki would crumple before its might, just as he had crumpled before.

"Shit, _come on,_ don't check out on me now."

He would break.

When he could again see, the scepter was not in his grasp. He was wrist deep in snow, and the biting press of his companion's arm as it wrapped around his chest was inspiring him to rise.

In the distance, lightning cracked open a tree. His thoughts could not be gathered. 

"Focus," he heard, the harsh words belying the worry he felt pulse from his companion. "Fucking _walk_."

He remembered this. The scepter, and a hand pressed into his back as he stumbled. 

"Don't pass out, we're almost there."

Another bolt. The flash burned into his clenched eyelids.

_You are property, pure and simple, to be used until we've rung out of you every last bit of profitable data we can possibly uncover._

His knees met ice.

He finally managed to call forth the Tesseract with desperate strength, and used it to transport them far away.

\------------

Bucky wandered around their shared place in the aftermath of their interrupted mission, turning the AC on as high as it would go. Their main objective had been achieved - the Tesseract had been stolen from HYDRA hands and simultaneously kept from those of the Avengers. 

Loki had come down from his freakout, but was still sulking in his room. Bucky knew enough of his volatile ally by now to know that leaving him alone could be just as likely to piss him off as barging in. 

He himself was feeling a lot more relaxed now that both the scepter and the Tesseract were in their possession. Especially since the latter could be used for instant travel to any reaches, farther than Loki could manage with just his magic alone.

That relaxation faded when there was a knock at their door.

Loki was out of his room in an instant, wearing a suit and overcoat, with the scepter disguised as a cane. His scarred eyes were locked onto the door.

Bucky nodded at him to signal readiness. He'd chosen the best positioned apartment for an attack, so they were as prepared as they could be for this moment. 

He carefully checked the peep hole, ready to dodge if there was a gun on the other side.

There wasn't.

A man wearing a hoodie stood at the end of the hall. He had no visible weapons.

"I can come back if now's not a good time," his voice called out. 

Loki suddenly appeared beside the man in the hall, then there was a green flash as he teleported them both back into the apartment, holding the front of the sweater tight in his grasp. 

_In the goddamn apartment?_ Bucky demanded. 

_He would have drawn more attention if he'd remained out there shouting. Besides, you were planning on moving again by the end of the week._ Out loud, Loki spoke lowly. "Hello, Director Fury."

"So you do remember me. Wasn't sure about that. Damn, it is _cold_ in here." Their visitor - who stoked mild familiarity in Bucky's mind but not much else - stood firm even as Loki loomed over him. "Got some pretty cataracts there, Real Power." He slowly held up his hands. "I'm just here to talk."

"How kind of you to finally visit." Loki sneered. "Your schedule must have been quite full during the two years your organization held me."

Fury's hands spread wider. "And I think the fact that you haven't killed me yet means you already know that I didn't have much to do with that. I did everything I could to argue in favor of your release to Asgard."

Loki's lips twisted. He pulled Fury around and shoved him down into a fancy armchair, one that he had spent nearly a half an hour arguing in favor of acquiring against Bucky's preferred expediently minimal and defensive furnishings.

Fury looked cautiously between them as he made himself comfortable. "I have eyes everywhere. They tend to notice something like the sudden repeated appearances of weird green light just before a HYDRA base gets blown to hell with no survivors."

 _Told you,_ Bucky thought.

Loki made a gesture and turned their wall-mounted air conditioner into a covered fire pit filled with coals. Fury turned his head to stare in bemusement at the new heat-producing furniture that had been placed next to him. 

"You said you were cold," Loki pointed out, far too innocently.

Bucky sighed. _Really?_

Loki was unapologetic. _If you took the time to study magic you would be able to fix that._

Fury looked like he wasn't quite sure to take the closeness of red glowing coals as a threat or politeness. Which was smart, because those two things weren't exactly mutually exclusive when it came to Loki.

Just about now though Bucky was pretty sure he'd just done it because he was a petty bastard.

"You weren't numbered among the bodies when Project Insight collapsed most of SHIELD and HYDRA," Fury said. "Either of you." A single eye locked onto Bucky. "You know that Captain Rogers is still looking for you."

"I think I would like to teleport you into the center of an active volcano," Loki said, and Bucky felt the brush of genuine pleasure from him through their connection.

"Your ideas are way too elaborate," Bucky griped, already feeling too hot at his proximity to the coals. "Just use a damn bullet."

"You mean like you tried to do?" Fury asked, and Bucky went silent with a frown. "Or do you even remember that?"

He didn't. There was something, but it was too far out of reach. 

Loki moved closer to the armchair, and Bucky knew that it was part intimidation, and part to ensure he had the clearest view of Fury possible through his damaged eyes. "Feel free to make haste with your point."

"If you're planning on continuing on this path, I can offer you information. I like to encourage people who seem to have the same goals that I do. Especially if they've moved on from trying to take over the world to making it a bit of a better place."

"Mere happenstance," Loki said. "A checklist of targets that you do not know whether or not you are at the end of."

"Then maybe I can extend it," Fury said. "I'm not discounting your strength, especially that now I'm pretty sure you have the Tesseract on top of the scepter, and it looks like HYDRA tried their best to turn the Winter Soldier into another one of you. Which reminds me - I have something for you, Sergeant Barnes, if you'll let me remove it from my pocket."

Loki took a step back, his expression curious. Fury took the space to stand up and pulled out a small case. He held it out towards Bucky. 

"Photostatic veil," he explained as Bucky checked the contents. "Natasha Romanoff wore that as a disguise before I shot Alexander Pierce. Figured it might be easier for you to stay incognito if you didn't have to wander around looking like a bluebird." He turned back to Loki. "Your brother had no idea about the stuff that was happening to you with HYDRA. Even then, he blamed himself that you never went home where you belonged."

Loki's face was stone. "I am sure I would have felt very touched about that fact as your human scientists pulled my bowels from my body."

Fury turned back to Bucky with a scowl, probably realizing anything he said to Loki would only make things worse. "Do me a favor - at least send Captain Rogers some kind of message to let him know you're all right. I'm not even working directly with the man right now and he's giving me six shades of agita."

Bucky did not even consider the idea for half a second before he discarded it. "Was that it?"

"I think I've made my offer clear." Fury made his way to the door, glancing over his shoulder. "Normally I'd leave a vague contact or something, say that you shouldn't count on being able to find me yourselves...but I have a feeling that with you two that won't be a problem. Just think about it."

\----------

They spent the next week changing locations. Loki deeply desired to find somewhere far from people, a task made easier through use of the Tesseract. A generously sized cottage was acquired, and with some careful words and use of the scepter, their renter would never recall their faces quite clearly, or question their modifications to her property.

When they settled, Bucky completely rearranged the cottage to better favor combat and escape while Loki sat with the scepter upon his lap.

_So you do remember me. Wasn't sure about that._

Whatever he had been before, Loki was now accustomed to not having every piece of information when it came to his own life. He'd long accepted that his captivity and extensive exposure to lightning had dulled more than his vision.

After he had finished blocking up the windows, only then did Bucky speak. "Fury has another motive," he said, clearly noticing the string of Loki's thoughts. 

"Of course he does," Loki said. 

"So when are we going after him?"

Loki tested the results of the spell that he had used to tag Fury during their brief contact. The man moved nearly as much as they did, but there were a few locations he often returned to frequent. 

He sat back, feeling for the Tesseract in his pocket dimension. 

"Soon," he answered.

\----------

They moved in to one of the locations when Fury was elsewhere. The SHIELD agents present on the property were forced into unconsciousness. They only spent as long as they needed for Bucky to hack into and steal their files before they transported themselves to the next spot.

Fury would know what they had done before long. Loki did not care. He wanted it, the excuse to kill him.

"This file is the most recent opened in the history out of all of them," Bucky said at the final location. "It has timestamps of use from just before and after he came and talked to us."

"Then that is the one we shall look into first," Loki said.

They returned to their cottage, along with some equipment stolen from an electronics store. 

The file contained a video feed. Loki had to strain to see it well, leaning over Bucky's shoulder and bracing his hand against the back of the chair where the man sat.

It showed himself, naked but for the Asgardian cuffs, sitting on the floor of a metal cell, his skin streaked with fresh surgical and electrical scars. His eyes were sunken and ringed with dark marks, and his position and his bearing showed just how beaten he felt.

Alexander Pierce's voice sounded, sparking anger and revulsion. "I'd like to revisit our discussion on the Chitauri."

"If we must," he heard himself answer.

"Their force was destroyed when Tony Stark carried the missile through the portal you created."

A shrug. "Your recollection of the event is as good as mine."

"I'd hazard a guess that they aren't the only armies out there that would seek to take a piece out of Earth. You opened a doorway to more than their travel. You gave them knowledge of us, according to your brother."

Loki saw himself shake his head. "They had knowledge through the decades of reckless tampering of the Tesseract on Earth. I only convinced them that I knew rather more about your planet than I actually did."

Pierce's posture perked up in keen interest. "And why would you need to do that?"

No answer.

"Who sent you to us? Who used you to lead an army?"

"No one. I arrived to rule your planet of my own volition."

"Is that the truth?" 

"Yes."

"I don't think it is. And I would really like if you could help me understand what exactly it is we could be dealing with if whoever is out there decides to try again."

No answer. Loki knew that they had to be employing the scepter to gain his cooperation at this point, but seeing himself so cowed even in his defiance still sent bile to the back of his throat.

Pierce sighed, and moved to his feet. The group left the cell, and the Loki on screen was incapacitated by a lengthy charge of lightning. 

Loki felt a section of the chair break off into his hand as he saw for the first time what such an attack looked like from the outside, the branching white current rushing through his mouth and eyes with condensed intensity. 

The cell door opened again - they must have had a way of draining the energy from the metal to make it safe for contact so soon. Pierce re-entered, still looking angry. "Get him pinned," he snapped. 

Loki was cuffed to the floor, his muzzle replaced. Pierce stood with his hands folded, staring down as he waited for Loki to regain sense. 

Pierce held out his hand, closing his fingers around the handle of a long baton that was pressed into it. He lashed it out at Loki's face, snapping the weapon violently against his head and body multiple times in an explosion of rage. When he finally stopped he was red-faced, and he handed the weapon back to his subordinate as he caught his breath.

He knelt beside Loki and gripped harshly into his welted face. "It's for the best for all of us if we could eventually count on your full cooperation."

Then he released him, adjusting his tie. "I want him wiped. Make him forget this."

One of his men spoke up in concern. "The doc says the chair wouldn't work on his physiology."

"No, but this cell does well enough." Pierce was already on his way out of the cell. "Raise the settings. He'll heal. Sedate him if you have to, so he doesn't realize. As many times as it takes."

The video did not end there. When the humming started, Loki fled by teleporting himself into his room so he would not have to watch what would follow.

\----------

Bucky sorted through the files they'd stolen in a horrified disconnect over the next several hours, with diligent concentration to intake anything useful. He took notes in case he didn't remember everything. 

Maybe he should have checked on Loki, but they needed what was on those files, and he could feel Loki trying to block him out completely through the scepter while he had his meltdown.

It was well through the night when he finished. His stomach felt like one gigantic cramp. A layer of frost fell from his skin when he moved.

The lights were off in Loki's room. He sat in the center of his bed with the scepter and the Tesseract resting in front of him, their individual glows reflecting off the pointed features of his face.

Bucky stopped in the doorway. "He tried different ways to word it, but you didn't tell Pierce anything more than what you already did."

Loki's brow creased, but there was no reaction otherwise. Bucky didn't need their weird blood-scepter bond to know that he was in a bad way mentally.

"You know that's a big part of the reason Fury wanted to reach out to us. Do you remember who sent you?"

Finally Loki's eyes moved towards him, but he knew between the dark and the distance that he would have had a terrible time seeing any details on Bucky's form. 

Bucky, on the other hand, had no problems seeing the white line of bared teeth that presented on Loki's face. 

"Why," Loki demanded. "Would _you_ seek to question me, now?"

"No. Figure there's more immediate threats," Bucky answered honestly. "Fury knows the basics already no matter how much more detail he gets after the fact."

Loki went quiet. "Pierce was clever. If I remember anything, it is that I always seem to have a poor estimation of humans, to my own detriment."

"He's dead," Bucky reminded. "Wasn't clever enough to avoid that."

"Is that what you say to comfort yourself?"

Bucky jerked a shoulder up. "We can try to kill Fury. Might lead to more eyes on us, if he's telling people we're out here."

"You already have a preference on which path you would have us take," Loki said, his star-pointed cataracts gleaming in the dark. "Say it."

"If we're keeping out of this, we need to quit now. The fight might show up anyway, but...we need to stop looking for it. Even with just the two of us, it draws too much attention."

He felt the pulse of strong protest from Loki's end, and the small thread of longing that was overloaded by his refusal. He wasn't going to stop. Stopping wasn't safe, especially if whatever was out there decided to come to them.

Loki grasped the scepter, sliding from the bed like a rising cobra, his snarl growing more pronounced as he came near. "No. I said _say it._ "

Bucky felt his own emotions completely obliterate Loki's on the 'this is a fucking bad idea' front. "We should start a line of contact with the Avengers."

Loki went still, shocked that Bucky had come out and admitted it. For a moment, his snarl slackened, and his gaze turned away. 

Then he shook his head, and a deranged smile pulled at his face. "I think...you should go first," he said, and lashed his hand out with the Tesseract in his palm, pressing it against Bucky's chest until the world faded into blue.

He was standing in a different room. Loki and the scepter and the Tesseract were nowhere to be seen. Even their connection was faint. 

But Bucky was sending every goddamn swear word that he knew down the line. 

On the bed in front of him, having just jerked completely awake, because this was his personal bedroom in the fucking _Avengers compound_ , was Steve Rogers.

\----------

It was never Loki's intention to leave Bucky for long. And it had not really been his fault, the choices that lay before them.

Loki was beginning to suspect that there was no one to blame for his failings but himself.

For just a moment, he considered running. Truly running, across space, for as long as it took. But he had knowledge stirring in the back of his mind - what eagerly awaited him in the far reaches of the universe would be no kinder than what had at the hands of HYDRA. 

He had both the scepter and the Tesseract. He had full control of his magic. And he had an ally that, perhaps even now, did not seek to control or abandon him. His senses had been dulled, but that was a small issue in the scope of his power. 

He had to take the opportunity now, before he lost his nerve.

_Scared of a little lightning?_

The answer, as always, was _yes._

He closed his eyes and sought out the beacon of lightning. 

He was in a room dimly lit by moonlight that flooded in through large windows. A man with golden hair was in a deep sleep beneath thick blankets, the sound of his snoring filtering towards Loki's ears.

He immediately felt a strengthening in the tense panic from Bucky. _Fucking asshole. I'm going to freeze your goddamn balls off when I find you._

Loki only half paid attention as he approached the body on the bed, parsing through memories in his mind. He saw vague images, a brilliant smile and golden light, darkness and torment, longing and despair. He both knew him and did not know him.

He stretched out his hand.

Thor Odinson opened his eyes with a crack of thunder.


End file.
